Of course, one of the most rewarding things about learning to make something with your own hands is that you can pass that know-how to other people. As students put the finishing touches on their shelving units and sawhorses, I get to chatting with Kathleen Lokey, a flannel-clad farmer from Greenville, Tennessee, who works for a nonprofit called Rural Resources. Through a series of workshops and training programs, the organization equips low-income, food-insecure teens in her area with the skills they need to take care of their nutritional needs, including many of the old-timey ones Daisy Luther teaches: growing their own fresh fruit and produce, canning, pickling, and making jams.
Contrary to what a lot of people think, the most important thing you need to survive a disaster is water. The body can go weeks without food but only a few days without water. And once you start getting dehydrated, there goes your energy levels, your clear-headedness, and your ability to make rational decisions. You will need this gear to ensure your supply of water:
I.N.C.H. pack: I'm Never Coming Home pack. A pack containing everything needed to walk out into the woods and never return to society. It is a heavy pack loaded with the gear needed to accomplish any wilderness task, from building shelter to gaining food, designed to allow someone to survive indefinitely in the woods. This requires skills as well as proper selection of equipment, as one can only carry so much. For example, instead of carrying food, one carries seeds, steel traps, a longbow, reel spinners and other fishing gear.[citation needed]
We talk a lot about the 80-20 rule (the “Pareto principle”) on The Prepared. For example, 20% of the total possible work gets you 80% prepared. To go from 80% to 100% prepared requires a lot more work and money. Another example is that you should prepare for the 80% of likely scenarios, not the unlikely ones like fascist zombies arriving on a radioactive alien asteroid.
Purchase some thermometers from local home repair stores like Lowe’s, Menard’s, Home Depot, etc. I use one outside to see the outside temperature year round, one in the garage just to see where we stand year round and one in my storage area in the lower level (basement)of the house. Check them on a regular basis. Last winter was so cold and hubby wanted the temperature raised a little more in the house (he is a little older than me and I am going thru the change)but I was worried my food supplies might get too warm or there would be too much up and down changes of temperature. So every day I would go to the lower level (basement), open the door to the storage area and see what the thermometer was reading, if it was too cold I would leave the doors opened a bit and close them back when my readings stayed consistent. There is no heat pumped into this area only what may drift in under the door from the outer area that is heated or air conditioned. I try to keep my food supplies stable around 58 to 62 degrees year round.So far this temperature range is working, the canned food is still maintaining flavor, color and passes the smell test. No signs of critters either. Next step will be to add gallon buckets of food items and I will take into consideration all that I have read from all of you on things that did not go according to plan. Happy Thanksgiving to everyone! Keep on prepping.
1. 20 pounds of Rice. As boring as it may sound, rice is one of the backbones of every food storage plan. It is filling, nutritious and with the use of varied seasonings and condiments, highly adaptable in a variety of tasty meals. The choice of white, brown or a combination of the two is up to you. White rice has a longer shelf life but brown rice has more nutritional benefits. In my own household, I like to combine the two along with some Jasmine, Basmati and Calrose sticky rice. NOTE: Be sure to check out recent guide on how to remove arsenic from rice.
Despite a lull following the end of the Cold War, survivalism has gained greater attention in recent years, resulting in increased popularity of the survivalist lifestyle, as well as increased scrutiny. A National Geographic show interviewing survivalists, Doomsday Preppers, was a "ratings bonanza"[81] and "the network's most-watched series",[82] yet Neil Genzlinger in The New York Times declared it an "absurd excess on display and at what an easy target the prepper worldview is for ridicule," noting, "how offensively anti-life these shows are, full of contempt for humankind."[83]
I don’t care if freezing doesn’t kill the bugs. The flour will be used to cook something. It will go into a baked item or be used to coat something for frying. Now I am not saying we shouldn’t take precautions against infestation. What I am saying is there has to be a balance. At what cost (in money, time and effort) is it worth it to make something absolutely safe? Personally, I don’t want to lose focus.
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Speaking of making mistakes here’s one of mine. One of the first things I ‘put back’ (as my Mom use to say in the fall before my Dad was out of work due to bad weather at the quarry), was a couple of extra bottles of vegetable oil. Well, other stuff got in front of them on the shelf and pretty soon they were 3 or 4 years old. Yes, they were rancid when I opened them. Taught me a good lesson on keeping track of what you have and using it before it goes bad. They are marked ‘not to eat’ and are now used to fuel some lanterns outside when we have cookouts.

The reason the vacuum sealing system’s up on this list is because I feel food has a much longer “shelf life” so to speak when its vacuum sealed before being thrown in the freezer. Used to have a lot of power outages when we lived in Toronto, and each time our food would thaw out a little it’d taste worse and worse – except for the one vacuum sealed slab of meat we got from a neighbour which I think withstood 2-3 power outages (one which lasted 4-5 days) and tasted as though it was vacuum packed the day before. I’ve also heard of people vacuum packing rice into smaller one-serving portions, and have always thought that a great idea for cases you might want to throw a bunch into a pack and go, or just generally extend the shelf life of your food/prevent rats and mice from getting into things. Necessary? No. Definitely still something I want, though.
Some gear items listed here are downright cool, while others are, plainly put – extremely practical. Most are one-time lifetime buys, while others, like the emergency food, you’ll hope you’ll never have to use up, but if/when you do, they’ll of course need to be replaced. Every item on this list is, in my opinion, is extremely valuable to have as a prepper, and while I’m sure there are many more survivalist wishlist-type items on the market, these are definitely the ones I find myself lusting over the most.
In both his book Rawles on Retreats and Relocation and in his survivalist novel, Patriots: A Novel of Survival in the Coming Collapse, Rawles describes in great detail retreat groups "upgrading" brick or other masonry houses with steel reinforced window shutters and doors, excavating anti-vehicular ditches, installing warded gate locks, constructing concertina wire obstacles and fougasses, and setting up listening post/observation posts (LP/OPs.) Rawles is a proponent of including a mantrap foyer at survival retreats, an architectural element that he calls a "crushroom".[8]
I feel so lost here….smart meters being forced on your house, then they catch fire and the insurance co. refuses to cover, they also emit radiation 24/7 at a much higher frequency that first reported (Watch “Take Back Your Power, by Josh Del Sol–excellent info on these cancer causing devices), the fracking ruining our water, the greedy corporate “health” system with their outrageous prices for meds that then maker you sicker, the chemicals in our food,air,water,environment, the ‘me me’people, —with their huge egos & the ‘hell with everybody else’ attitude that you encounter with almost everyone you meet anymore, 1/2 the country is gonna be doped up on pot & too stupid to be of any real help when the SHTF, the other half—well, they will need their anxiety meds and as soon as they run out, will be frozen in fear and mental cloudiness and start to go off the deep end in short order….. what the hell is going on anymore??? 5G is going up everywhere—the electric & phone companies want to blanket the universe with this shit & it’s been proven that all this crap is eroding your brain cells at an alarming clip, not to mention disrupting blood chemistry and your DNA, but do people listen??? Politicians, government, cops, lawyers, doctors, clergy, teachers we are supposed to trust them, but just look at the news……. every day there’s something. Who do you trust anymore?? Who do you believe? The powers that be, screaming take “God” out of schools, take him off money, everybody bitching if you say “Merry Christmas’— but yet we, (the United States), were founded on a Christian principal…..so much filth, disrespect, evil, hatred—all over the world anymore. It’s so sad….. what man has become. We are poisoning the well of our own offspring, a million times over…….
90. Short range rifle – The .22 LR rifle is regarded as the prepper’s best friend. The ammo is plentiful and extremely cheap and could always double as a barter item, so stock up! The Ruger 10/22 series is a make & model you can’t go wrong with. This rifle can be used for small game and can quite possibly be used for large game if no other rifle is available.
Additionally, some people may want to prioritize skills over supplies, the idea being if you have the skills you can make or find everything else. I will not derail the discussion by delving too far into that, but the fact is having what you need on hand will always save you labor and time. A truly skilled individual can sustain themselves with rudimentary or even no tools in very austere conditions, and there is no substitute for that kind of mastery, but no “lone survivor” who is honest would choose to go without provision or tools when the chips are down and they had a choice.
Mylar bags & Oxygen Absorbers: What I love about Mylar bags and oxygen absorbers is they protect against every single one of the food storage enemies. Prices do vary but for the most part, they are inexpensive and easy to keep on hand. And while you can seal them up with a FoodSaver, some tubing and a common clothes iron, I find it infinitely easier with a cheap hair straightening iron that you can pick up $20 or less.

I’ve gotten a lot of flour sugar, stuff for scratch cooking, something like bullion cubes, evaporated milk, yeast, can veggies you can throw together all kinds of soups. I ordered powdered eggs and butter, biscuits and gravy, homemade beans, I have done some canning, of meats and made some spatgetti sauce for canning. Think camping, I got a dutch oven-good for cakes and breads.

63. Snake bit kit – depending on where you live, not a necessity. But if your out about in the country especially in the southern half of the US, having a snake bit kit is wise. Here is a list of venomous snakes by state. These kits usually ome with a powerful suction extractor that can double for any poisonous bite or sting. Here is a decent snake kit.

If you've been looking for a book on being prepared this one can't be beat. It's a short read so you don't need to have tons of time to try to understand it but it has all the checklists and informative detail that will take you days to hunt down elsewhere. It has checklists for each area of preparedness, lists of things to acquire and the best way to go about doing all of it--all broken down into manageable chunks. This book is thorough, organized, and detailed without being long! I love it! If you follow the steps in the book you will be prepared for just about anything!!!

The MPS totes let in a little water when we submerged them. And the tote lid bent a little under the weight testing, but did not collapse or hurt the food. As expected, the cardboard boxes containing Mountain House foods got soggy immediately. But the packets of food themselves are waterproof. The boxes stacked well but didn’t offer nearly the same protection as the buckets.
The anti-democratic extremists don’t have the power to overthrow the US government – although when states like California openly defy federal law and declare themselves as “sanctuaries” for criminals, they might be closer to gaining it than most of us think. What they do have is the power to cause havoc at a local level, and if they coordinated their actions they could have a serious effect on law and order across multiple counties or even states. We’ve already seen that some fanatics, like Antifa, are willing to assault and rob anyone they define as a “fascist”, which is most of us. A sustained campaign by anarchists, the far left and race-based groups could cause social collapse lasting days or even weeks – and the longer it goes on, the more it’s going to test your preparedness. I think there’s a serious risk of that happening, because powerful people aren’t happy at the way democratic votes are going against them.
Thanks for another helpful article, Pat. I’d been wondering about long term food for my preps. I’ve never had MRE’s, although I have eaten “C” & “K” rations (remember those battleship gray-green cans?) an older relative brought home. My question is, how do I determine the best taste/value for my dollar? My goal of having 6 months to 1 year’s worth of food for a family will be significant in terms of money spent. Do you know of any “survival food” vendors who have trial offers for people to taste test BEFORE they plunk down 4 figures for boxes of… Read more »
Purchase some thermometers from local home repair stores like Lowe’s, Menard’s, Home Depot, etc. I use one outside to see the outside temperature year round, one in the garage just to see where we stand year round and one in my storage area in the lower level (basement)of the house. Check them on a regular basis. Last winter was so cold and hubby wanted the temperature raised a little more in the house (he is a little older than me and I am going thru the change)but I was worried my food supplies might get too warm or there would be too much up and down changes of temperature. So every day I would go to the lower level (basement), open the door to the storage area and see what the thermometer was reading, if it was too cold I would leave the doors opened a bit and close them back when my readings stayed consistent. There is no heat pumped into this area only what may drift in under the door from the outer area that is heated or air conditioned. I try to keep my food supplies stable around 58 to 62 degrees year round.So far this temperature range is working, the canned food is still maintaining flavor, color and passes the smell test. No signs of critters either. Next step will be to add gallon buckets of food items and I will take into consideration all that I have read from all of you on things that did not go according to plan. Happy Thanksgiving to everyone! Keep on prepping.
I know that you two are really heavily focused on gear, but I think something like having a solid stock of mason jars (various sizes) to fill with preserves would be a far better option then your plastic air tight sealing bags that will quickly run out in most situations. Why not just use ziplock bags if you must? For that matter, you’d probably want to have a big pot and a few key tools to cook your preserving in.
We thought about the generator / gas dilema for our filled 2 freezers, and decided to start our venture into solar with generating enough energy to run those. So far so good.We know that as long as we can run them for 12 hours a day, the food inside stays well frozen and safe. New England winters are cold enough at night that it keeps the garage cold where the freezers are, so thats a help. If we only open the freezer long enough to take out enough food for a few days, they can thaw in the fridge and that helps too. I love my freezer, lol.
I rotate my storage a lot and used it last year when my husband was laid off. What I found is that I prefer smaller cans because I usually don’t need larger sizes. We have three kids left at home at this point. We still only cook for 5 people, one meal at a time and if you are in a situation where you don’t have refrigeration you may not want to have to store the large can leftovers.
My military experience was let’s just say in the last century and MREs have gone through some pretty decent changes and updates since the time I was chowing down. For those who don’t know what an MRE is, the Acronym stands for Meal Ready to Eat and this is what is given to our soldiers when they aren’t near a mess hall. When I was in the field we would usually get an MRE for lunch. Breakfast and dinners would be a hot meal, or it started out as hot when we crowded around the mess tent or the insulated containers they drove out to us on the back of a jeep. By the time you got somewhere to eat your meal it was usually cold. We would only go to the field in the winter time naturally.
Thanks, Viet Nam Vet. People keep calling us a democracy but that is not our form of government. Our founding fathers were reluctant to have a true democracy because they correctly feared mob rule. It doesn’t bother me that government moves slowly. That keeps it from swaying to and fro in shallow breezes. Congress was supposed to be a deliberative body. The Supreme Court was supposed to be an even more deliberative body. Rapid response is only acceptable in the troops coming to your rescue, not in governments.

I’m a grandfather now and I’m a positive person, but being a prepper can be tough. It’s difficult to get others on board, for most it’s a no-go subject. A lot of my friends think I’m barking mad. It’s taken me three years to convince my daughter and her family to take more of an interest and, before she eventually became a full-blown enthusiast, my partner used to humour me politely.

A selection of old communications bunkers and underground data centers are also out there on the market, including a few for sale (where else?) on eBay. They’ll all require extensive TLC before they’re inhabitable. One 8,000-square-foot communications structure in Kansas built in 1958, for example, is listed at $650,000, though it comes with only one bathroom and no bedrooms to speak of. Another doomsday bunker near Tucson, Arizona, consists of a three-story command structure that’s 40 feet in diameter, surrounded by 12-inch-thick blast doors and buried under 10 feet of soil. The raw structure, described as “ready for sandblasting and paint” and shown in the photo with this slide, has a “Buy It Now” price of $550,000 on eBay.

I made the mistake of trying to wake people up to my concept of what the country was coming to. My view of shtf and how i thought it was going to happen. I also told people about my prepping and how i believed it would help. Now i’m pretty sure if anything did occur i would have a few or more uninvited guests. The one guy literally said “Im coming to your house if shit goes down” No the hell you aren’t. I tell people these things so they will prepare themselves. Or help them awaken to the things… Read more »

No flour/wheat because you need yeast, etc? Not completely true. If you have access to clean water (or milk/yoghurt), you can make Indian flat bread or chapattis! Once you get the hang of making them – basically adding tepid water to the flour until you can make a smooth and elastic dough, then roll it out and cook in a skillet – you can make endless variations! I often dissolve a vegetable or beef bouillon cube (you should stock those too, or instant bouillon) in the water first to add more flavor to the chapattis, but you can use any herbs you like. Getting the hang of making them might seem a little trying at first, but eventually whipping them up is just a breeze! My kids love eating them right out of the pan with a little butter spread on the still hot bread, and we often eat them together with beans, etc. Here’s a handy tutorial for those interested: //indianfood.about.com/od/breadrecipes/ig/How-to-Make-Chapatis/Making-Chapatis—Step-1.htm
“It was never offered as a contrary movement to hippies by any means,” Mitchell explains. “I think maybe it was just one more expression of ‘You can try something new now.’” Survivalism was and still is, Mitchell believes, a product of late capitalist consumer society, premised on drumming up panic about various hypothetical catastrophes and furnishing people with products that will allegedly help survive them.
buy land crisis disaster DIY doomsday economic collapse emergencies EMP EU food Food Crisis food supplies funny government How to invest long-term food supplies military militia natural cure news nuclear war Obamacare plant preparedness Prepper protect your family remedies reserve food Russia North Korea China self-defense self-sufficiency shtf survival survival plan taxes teotwawki terrorist water weapons
I do think there is a near universal “beginner’s checklist”. Regardless of where you live or what disasters tend to occur in your area (hurricanes, earthquakes, volcano eruptions), people still need the same basic supplies–water, food, medical, solid footwear and clothing. If you live in a tropical or subtropic climate like I do, your water needs will be greater than if you live in a cooler climate. I actually recommend the Texas Baptist’s Men’s water filtration system–cf. https://tbmtx.org/. You can pick up a system similar to the Big Berkey for a fraction of the cost. In terms of food, I think the author’s recommendation–that you just buy more of what you ordinarily use–is sound advise. Remember to rotate your food supplies–first in, first out. If you get a few extra cans each week, you can quickly build a three month supply of foods that your family regularly consumes. Once you get to a three-month food supply, it’s time to look into longer term food storage. I think the LDS Online Store is a great value. I think there are certain items every household should have–flashlights, extra batters, a cooler, extra ice in the freezer (I live in hurricane country), at least a shotgun and a handgun, extra ammo, a decent medical kit and so forth.
He also sees a regular clustering of things in popular culture, including Bear Grylls-style survivor shows on television and the proliferation of zombie apocalypse movies, which lead to peaks and troughs of prepping behaviour. “If you take a step back and look, you can see that there is an underlying yearning that is met by these behaviours,” he says.
I’ve gotten a lot of flour sugar, stuff for scratch cooking, something like bullion cubes, evaporated milk, yeast, can veggies you can throw together all kinds of soups. I ordered powdered eggs and butter, biscuits and gravy, homemade beans, I have done some canning, of meats and made some spatgetti sauce for canning. Think camping, I got a dutch oven-good for cakes and breads.
Below are two Prepper Supplies Checklist resources. The first is a free PDF of the original 17-page preppers supplies checklist. Over the years, I’ve collected feedback on how to improve the list and compiled the updated preppers supplies checklist into a book. The book is a 35-page “Preparedness Plan Workbook”. There are 9 categories of preparedness that are covered: Water, Food, Warmth, Light, First Aid, Hygiene, Communication, Financial, and Protection/Hunting. The Food & Water Checklists include formulas to determine how much of each you will need depending on the size of your family/group.
I very much agree the article was amazingly detailed but i am neutral about the permits…on one hand you can get them and the county will have on paper where your bunker is which by the way the general public can look at or take the risk of no permits and guarantee that no one other then yourself and whoever you choose knows the location of you bunker….personally i would take the risk….
Apparent sub missle launch, unscheduled, in Pacific Northwest near US base -- disavowed by media naturally. Purpose unknown. Venezuela switching to crypto currency? Fed interest rate hike supposed to take place today -- we said this might be a big week and it's panning out. California breakup now will be on November ballot. Many moving pieces in play. Stay alert.
Laura B. "You have no privacy on the internet, and probably never have."You got that almost rite, all except the word "probably." You have never had any privacy on the internet, and very little anywhere in this country for a lot longer than the internet has been around. Your credit cards track you and your perches. Your drivers license tracks you. Your phone, both cell and home, tracks you. Everything you buy, car, home, property, even the groceries you buy are tracked. Every bill you pay tracks you. The only way to not be tracked is to not have a birth certificate, a social security card, a credit/debit card, never own anything taxable and never pay for anything with anything but gold, silver, or barter. Even the government currency called the dollar has a # on it so it can be tracked. All the things I've listed were put in place for 1 reason, and that is to track. Privacy hasn't been a part of American life for over 100 yrs.
Wow Gaye. I read all comments, and I see one from “Katzcradul”, so we know you have a very important web site. (I already knew this) I saw one reader loves cheese and crackers when times get rough. Katxcradul has taught me to “wax cheese” for long term storage, and many, many canning techniques. Everyone should subscribe to Katzcradul’s U-tube videos.
So if you feel like the world’s not getting any better, consider saving money to spend for this doomsday shelter project. A regular unit costs around $200,000 while an apartment for multiple families is around $2 million. Radius has been building underground bunkers for three decades now. These are regularly meant for military uses but due to terrorist attacks and nuclear threats, the company created family models too.
58. N95 masks – if there is ever a pandemic, having a mask can be invaluable. Flu, sars, ebola, etc… when the crises hits these be will go fast, so stock up on some before they are needed. It is suggested to get the N95 quality valved respirators, although there is some debate on their effectiveness. A full face respirator will settle the question!
MRE stands for Meals Ready to Eat and they are essentially military food. This is the type of food soldiers are provided with when they aren’t near a facility or camp that has a mess hall. MREs come in cases of 12 and each waterproof foil bag contains one three-course meal. When you get MREs, you can choose from so many options that the variety is pretty decent. There are even vegetarian meals available. Brands of MREs include:
Not to mention the “year without a summer” that happened after the eruption of Mt. Tambora in the Dutch East Indies in 1815. The resulting ash and smoke plume blocked the sun enough to lower the average temperatures only by a few degrees. It was enough to trigger famines in North America and Europe for several years until temperatures gradually normalized. If the Yellowstone caldera erupts the smoke and ash would block the sun much as would a nuclear winter and would trigger even worse famines and suffering from people trying to cope with minimum if any infrastructure for heat, water, medical, etc. just for the simple reason that we’ve got way more people now and more of us live in urban areas.
He also sees a regular clustering of things in popular culture, including Bear Grylls-style survivor shows on television and the proliferation of zombie apocalypse movies, which lead to peaks and troughs of prepping behaviour. “If you take a step back and look, you can see that there is an underlying yearning that is met by these behaviours,” he says.
I wish we’d all stop using the term democracy when describing America. We’re a limited Constitutional Republic and there is a big difference between them. My concern is when you accept the other sides terms in a debate, you give them the upper hand and they control which way the debate goes. Same with gun control, allowing them to hammer in the words “Saturday night special” or ” assault weapons” lets them control which way things go and weakens our position.
I know how you feel when you get that urgent feeling that what you have is not enough. Shelly (the Survival Husband) and I were just talking about this last night. In my mind, I know that I have a lot but I keep purchasing more. Luckily, like you I am good at food rotation although I do have a lot of #10 tins and properly packaged buckets in deep storage as well. Those do not get rotated.
1. 20 pounds of Rice. As boring as it may sound, rice is one of the backbones of every food storage plan. It is filling, nutritious and with the use of varied seasonings and condiments, highly adaptable in a variety of tasty meals. The choice of white, brown or a combination of the two is up to you. White rice has a longer shelf life but brown rice has more nutritional benefits. In my own household, I like to combine the two along with some Jasmine, Basmati and Calrose sticky rice. NOTE: Be sure to check out recent guide on how to remove arsenic from rice.
Most of us have some sort of toolkit around the house, but if you want to be prepared you need to make sure it’s ready for anything. At a minimum you’ll need a good carpenter’s hammer, a heavier ball peen hammer, wood saw and hacksaw. Other essentials include a monkey wrench, measuring tape, square and level. Cordless drills are great, but a hand drill is also good to have – what if your generator goes and you need to fabricate a replacement part? A set of good screwdrivers is also vital – don’t rely on an electric one. Make sure you have wrenches to fit all bolts on your vehicles and equipment, too.
The Hawaii false alarm was indeed a wake-up call! Thank you for publishing all this useful information. I’ve always done food storage but there is so much more we need to have on hand. All those little things you need, like knives, compass, a RADIO! – someone mentioned thick soled shoes and of course water filtration. I recently found an awesome 72 Hour backpack I thought was a pretty good deal on costco.com (https://www.costco.com/72-Hour-Tactical-Backpack-Survival-Kit.product.100386699.html?pageSize=96&catalogId=10701&dept=All&langId=-1&keyword=72+Hour+Tactical+Backpack+Survival+Kit&storeId=10301).
When doing a mixed container, I put the Ziploc bag with various condiments from Taco Bell and other places, salt, pepper, hot sauce soup mixes and lots of things which can be put in the cracks and crevices in there. Also, put in the Ziploc with matches( in a small spice bottle) a couple of boxcutters and a manual can opener. Sam’s had tomato sauce, crushed tomatoes, etc. for three dollars and change per #10 can.

Quick and easy foods help you through times when you are psychologically or physically unable to prepare your basic storage items. No cook foods such as freeze-dried are wonderful since they require little preparation. MRE’s (Meals Ready to Eat), such as many preparedness outlets carry, canned goods, etc. are also very good. Psychological Foods are the goodies – Jello, pudding, candy, etc. – you should add to your storage.

Grylls makes great products. I use a lot of his gear when backpacking and this is a definite must. I have been through a couple hundred strikes on this and there is still about 90% of the flint left. It packs away very nicely and is very easy to use. You can produce huge sparks on this if you align the striker and flint properly. The cord that holds the two pieces together does get in the way a little bit since it is fairly short but if you make slow methodical strikes, the cord doesn't get the way too much. If anything it helps make sure that you don't get the two pieces separated. I would definitely recommend this product over other on the market. I bought this for just over $10 over a year ago and have used it on camping trips about every month since then. I ... full review
Meal Kit Supply sent me a box and I opened it up looking for some differences in the contents on the bag and searching for my old favorites because I was definitely getting the best MRE and I wouldn’t be stuck with the Beef patty. I was surprised at the options. For starters we didn’t have anything vegetarian when I was in the service, but this box had Vegetarian Ratatouille, Vegetarian Lasagna and Apple Maple Rolled Oats. Breakfast?? They also had the old standbys of Pork Sausage Patty and it looked like my Meatballs with Barbecue sauce was changed to Meatballs in Marinara sauce. That is what I decided to taste first.
Above ground level, this 4,500 square-foot luxury house, located about 140 miles west of Dallas, has three bedrooms, four-and-a-half bathrooms, commercial-grade kitchen appliances, endless prairie and lake views, and even a private golf putting green. Below grade, there’s a 1,000-square-foot structure with reinforced steel walls, bunks for 12, plus a kitchen, laundry facilities, a periscope so survivors can view whatever remains on the post-apocalypse surface, and two hidden escape hatches. The bunker comes equipped with an NBC (nuclear, biological, chemical) filter system and a hydroponic plant-growing system. Six backup tanks of oxygen, as well as 10 years’ worth of emergency ready-to-eat meals, are included in the sale too.
Anyway, in a general crisis only organized communities are likely to practice formal kinds of ‘execution’ or exiling. For North American urbs, formal reorganizing is initially unlikely; as with the failing Roman Empire, people will attempt to maintain prior forms until it’s clear that those require much more than that which is locally available (ie., records, ‘honest’ record-keeping, knowledge, skills, imported or difficult materials…).
TIP: FEMA recommends that citizens have enough supplies on hand to get them through 72 hours after a disaster. We know a 72 hours bag is not going to be enough. I have put together a list of items from some of the top survival pros. Their recommendations are a great place start if you are new to prepping. If you are a long time prepper, check if you have these items as part of your survival gear.

They have a huge selection of dehydrated and freeze-dried foods from top brands such as Saratoga Farms, Mountain House, EasyPrep, OvaEasy, Yoders, Datrex, Mainstay, WonderMill, and more. They also have a complete selection of MRE Military Meals. These include self-heating kits with meals like spaghetti, sweet and sour chicken, and garden vegetables in tomato sauce.

Been thinking about stockpiling some long life food as been a carer for my wife for 14 years and after 12 years of nothing we managed to save $10K which was going to be to fix up the house but decided to put all into the stock market. Well, I have managed to turn it into 140K and although we are well under deeming cutoffs and amount where we lose some pension I was thinking about getting $20K in the long life food with 25 year life span. Just looking at the way food prices have gone up I’d estimate in 10 years the same food will be double.
The U.S. government is preparing its most direct response yet to the new Ebola outbreak that appears to have begun in April, readying staffers from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to deploy to multiple communities in Congo. -- Ebola in the U.S. 2.o?? Returning medical workers coming back to the mainland again? Without quarantine? Again. Keep an eye on it.
“The answer is you probably could,” she said. Though research suggests it might cause a mild depletion of vitamin C and other antioxidant chemicals, she explained, freeze-drying fruits and vegetables doesn’t have any significant impact on their nutritional value; packaged as stand-alone ingredients, they can even make for a healthy alternative to more caloric snack foods.